1. I ACCIDENTALLY VAPORIZE MY PRE-ALGEBRA TEACHER
1. I ACCIDENTALLY VAPORIZE MY PRE-ALGEBRA TEACHER
Look, I didn't want to be a demi-god
If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: stop reading this right now. Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life. Trust me, the life of demi-god is not one you will want to lead.
Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. And most of the time, You'll end up fighting monsters, and sometimes the Ares kids .
If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.
But if you recognize yourself in these pages—if you feel something stirring inside—stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you, and you might not have a Satyr around to save you.
Don't say I didn't warn you.
My name is Yamaguchi Tadashi.
I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at YancyAcademy, a private school for troubled kids in Miyagi.
Am I a troubled kid?
Yeah. You could say that.
I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to yamagata— twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.
I know—it sounds like torture. Most Yancy field trips were. Especially if you didn't have any friends.
But Mr. Takeda, our history teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.
Mr. Takeda was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning balck hair and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.
I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.
Boy, was I wrong.
See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Indian culture fest, I had this accident with a slingshot. I wasn't aiming for the teacher, but of course, I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we went to a volleyball game at a local high school and I fell over one of the bars and let's just say the whole section of the bleachers fell down. And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.
This trip, I was determined to be good.
All the way into the city, I put up with Yūji Terushima, the undercut, dyed blond kleptomaniac boy, hitting my best friend Nishinoya in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.
Noya was an easy target. He was short. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria. Or one of the girls forgot their blazers.
Anyway, yuji terushima was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his gelled black and blonde strip hair, and he knew I couldn't do anything back to him because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.
"I'm going to kill him," I mumbled.
Nishnoya tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."
He dodged another piece of yuji’s lunch.
"That's it." I started to get up, but nishinoya pulled me back to my seat.
"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."
Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked him right then and there. In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.
Mr. Takeda led the museum tour.
He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.
It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.
He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Yamaka, would give me the evil eye.
Mrs. yamaka was this little math teacher from kochi who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was 20 years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.
From her first day, Mrs. yamaka loved terushima and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.
One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told noya I didn't think Mrs. Yamaka was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."
Mr. Takeda kept talking about Greek funeral art.
Finally, terushima snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you shut up?"
It came out louder than I meant it to.
The whole group laughed. Mr. takdea stopped his story.
"Mr. yamaguchi ," he said, "did you have a comment?"
My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."
Mr. takeda pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"
I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"
"Yes," Mr. takeda said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because ..."
"Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and—"
"God?" Mr. tadeka asked.
"Titan," I corrected myself. "And ... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters—"
"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.
"—and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."
Some snickers from the group.
Behind me, yuji terushima mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"
"And why, Mr. yamaguhci," takeda said, "to paraphrase Mister terushima excellent question, does this matter in real life?"
"Busted," nishinoya muttered.
"Shut up," yuji hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.
At least terushima got packed, too. Mr. takeda was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.
I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."
"I see." Mr. takeda looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. yamaguchi. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. yamaka, would you lead us back outside?"
The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.
noya and I were about to follow when Mr. Takeda said, "Mr. Yamaguchi ."
I knew that was coming.
I told nishinoya to keep going. Then I turned around. "Sir?"
Mr. takeda had this look that wouldn't let you go— intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.
"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. takeda told me.
"About the Titans?"
"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."
"Oh."
"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, tadashi yamaguchi."
I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.
I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. But Mr. Takeda expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C– in my life. No—he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.
I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Takeda took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.
He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.
The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along the street side.
Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.
Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Yuji terushima was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Yamaka wasn't seeing a thing.
noya and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school—the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.
"Detention?" noya asked through a mouth full of sandwich.
"Nah," I said. "Not from takeda. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean—I'm not a genius."
nishinoya didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your banana ?"
I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.
I watched the stream of cabs going down street, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.
Mr. takeda parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel named ‘ a world of thorns’. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table.
I was about to unwrap my sandwich when yuji terushima appeared in front of me with his ugly friends—I guess he'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists—and dumped his half-eaten lunch in nishinoya's lap.
"Oops." he grinned at me with his crooked teeth. His roots definitely needed a touch up.
I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.
I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, terushima was sitting on his butt in the fountain, screaming, "tadashi pushed me!"
Mrs. Yamaka materialized next to us.
Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see—"
"—the water—"
"—like it grabbed him—"
I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.
As soon as Mrs. yamaka was sure poor little yuji was okay, promising to get him a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. yamaka turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey—"
"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."
That wasn't the right thing to say.
"Come with me," Mrs. yamaka said.
"Wait!" noya yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."
I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs.nishinoya scared nishinoya to death not like i can say she didn't do the same to me”
She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.
"I don't think so, Mr. yuu ," she said.
"But—"
"You—will—stay—here."
Nishinoya looked at me desperately.
"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."
"Honey," Mrs. yamaka barked at me. "Now."
Yuji terushima smirked.
I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare. Then I turned to face Mrs. yamaka, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.
How'd she get there so fast?
I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.
I wasn't so sure.
I went after Mrs.yamaka.
Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at nishinoya. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. takeda like he wanted Mr. takeda to notice what was going on, but Mr. takeda was absorbed in his novel.
I looked back up. Mrs. yamaka had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.
Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for terushima at the gift shop.
But apparently that wasn't the plan.
I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.
Except for us, the gallery was empty.
Mrs. yamaka stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.
Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. yamaka. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...
"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.
I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."
She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"
The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.
She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.
I said, "I'll—I'll try harder, ma'am."
Thunder shook the building.
"We are not fools, Tadashi Yamaguchi ," Mrs. Yamaka said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."
I didn't know what she was talking about.
All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.
"Well?" she demanded.
"Ma'am, I don't..."
"Your time is up," she hissed.
Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.
Then things got even stranger.
Mr.takeda, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.
"What ho, yamaguchi!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.
Mrs. yamaka lunged at me.
With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword—Mr. takeda’s bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.
Mrs. yamaka spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.
My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.
She snarled, "Die, honey!"
And she flew straight at me.
Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.
The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. Hisss!
Mrs. yamaka was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.
I was alone.
There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.
Mr. takeda wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.
My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.
Had I imagined the whole thing?
I went back outside.
It had started to rain.
nishinoya was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Yuji terushima was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to his ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. kuzuri whipped your butt."
I said, "Who?"
"Our teacher. Duh!"
I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. kuzuri. I asked terushima what he was talking about.
he just rolled his eyes and turned away.
I asked noya where Mrs. yamaka was.
He said, "Who?"
But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.
"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."
Thunder boomed overhead.
I saw Mr. takeda sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.
I went over to him.
He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. yamaguchi."
I handed Mr. takeda his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.
"Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. yamaka?"
He stared at me blankly. "Who?"
"The other chaperone. Mrs. yamaka. The pre-algebra teacher."
He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "tadashi, there is no Mrs. yamaka on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. yamaka at YancyAcademy. Are you feeling alright?"